Nikki Renée Daniels, Jeff Kready, Karen Ziemba and More Featured in KMC's BROADWAY CLOSE UP Series

Kaufman Music Center's virtual Broadway Close Up performances will continue this spring with two intimate lecture-concerts exploring the lives, careers and music of Kay Swift and one of the longest-running collaborations in show business history, Fred Ebb and John Kander. Hosted by Theater@Kaufman Director Sean Hartley and filmed in Merkin Hall, these one-hour performances pair lively and informative lectures with performances of songs from musicals including Fine and Dandy and Cabaret. Cast members are Tony winner Karen Ziemba (Contact, Curtains), Nikki Renée Daniels (Company, Hamilton, The Book of Mormon, Porgy and Bess), Jeff Kready (A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder), Sally Wilfert (Assassins), Klea Blackhurst and music directors Georgia Stitt and Jihwan Kim.

Host Sean Hartley will answer questions submitted by audience members at live post-performance Q&As. Questions may be submitted in advance or during the performance and Q&A to questions@kaufmanmusiccenter.org.

Monday, April 19, 7 pm ET: Broadway Close Up: Kay Swift

With host Sean Hartley and Nikki Renée Daniels, Jeff Kready, Sally Wilfert and Klea Blackhurst Music Directed by Georgia Stitt

Sean Hartley and a stellar cast of Broadway performers explore the life and music of composer Kay Swift (1897-1993). The first woman to write the score to a successful Broadway musical, Fine and Dandy, Swift is often remembered as George Gershwin's lover. Did Swift's long relationship with Gershwin help her career, or prevent her from reaching her full potential? Why are there almost no female composers from the 1930s to the 1950s, and what dynamics did women in the field need to navigate at that time? Discover Swift's dramatic life story, and hear her hit songs from Fine and Dandy, musical revues, and the Hollywood film Never a Dull Moment.

TICKETS

Monday, May 10, 7 pm ET: Broadway Close Up: Kander & Ebb

Hosted by Sean Hartley and featuring Tony winner Karen Ziemba

Music Directed by Jihwan Kim

One of longest-running collaborations in the history of show business, John Kander (b.1927) and Fred Ebb (1928-2004) wrote 14 shows together over 42 years, including Cabaret, Chicago and Kiss of the Spider Woman as well as music for the Martin Scorsese film New York, New York. Kander and Ebb stretched the limits of musical theater by addressing some of the most daring subjects ever to be tackled on Broadway, but the scores themselves tend to be solidly in the Broadway mainstream. Learn the stories behind the musicals, and hear songs from Cabaret, Flora the Red Menace, 70 Girls, 70, The Happy Time and New York, New York. Tony winner Karen Ziemba will share the inside scoop on the 1997 musical Steel Pier, written for her by Kander and Ebb.

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